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ELL News Headlines

Throughout the week, Colorín Colorado gathers news headlines related to English language learners from around the country. The ELL Headlines are posted Monday through Friday and are available for free!

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What role does music play in our national dialogue about immigration? Six young musicians, rooted in six different countries, gathered at Ellis Island, and in Manhattan, to explore that question in a new composition inspired by Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land."

In this excerpt from a 1998 Newsweek article, Garrison Keillor explains why immigrants are his heroes: "To give up your country is the hardest thing a person can do: to leave the old familiar places and ship out over the edge of the world to America and learn everything over again different than you learned as a child, learn the new language that you will never be so smart or funny in as in your true language. It takes years to start to feel semi-normal. And yet people still come."

About 30 students attending a Purdue Polytechnic Institute robotics camp first turned their workshop into LEGO Land for a week and then received a visit from Billy, a robot made out of LEGOs and mechanical sensors. Lauro Ojeda, a research scientist at the University of Michigan, led a demonstration at the camp Friday featuring Billy, which he had programmed to complete a task that all kids are familiar with — drawing. The annual robotics camp allows students, ages 8 to 14, to be immersed in the world of robotics for three hours a day during a week-long camp, said camp director Joe Fuehne, who also is director of the Purdue Polytechnic Institute in Columbus. But this year, Fuehne and his team changed the strategy behind one of the camps. For the first time since establishing it 12 years ago, Fuehne partnered with IT Robotics, which recently opened in North Vernon, to offer a free camp specifically for Latino students.

A horse named Millie is helping Abdul Alnajjar, David Rugazura and other refugee children at a Lansdowne Elementary summer camp learn about their new community. Millie was rescued from a wild herd of horses in Knott County and since March has lived at the Kentucky Equine Humane Center, a rescue farm in Jessamine County. As part of the center’s education program called Take the Reins, about 20 students from the Lansdowne camp on Wednesday toured the facilities and met Millie, the horse that they have been fostering this summer, said Karen Gustin, the Executive Director of the Kentucky Equine Humane Center.

For Dorchester parent Roberto Cardoso, the pressure to find a summer camp for Lianna, his 8-year-old daughter and only child, never goes away. He"s already worried about what she"ll be doing in the summer of 2018. This summer, though, they lucked out. Lianna, an incoming fourth-grader at the Roger Clap School, is attending a free, five-week summer program at the Hale Reservation in Westwood, a place her father had always wanted to send her to but was too costly for them. This year, she is one of 2,200 Boston Public School students who were selected for the "5th Quarter of Learning," a new component of the city's larger summer learning project that combines academics and outdoor recreational activities.

Learning and laughter filled the trailer classrooms at Knollwood Elementary School last month as English as a Second Language students from across Rowan County participated in a summer camp. Sixty-four rising first-, second- and third-grade ESL students came to Knollwood to experience a summer-camp atmosphere while expanding and reinforcing the English skills they had gained throughout the school year.Sixty-four rising first-, second- and third-grade ESL students came to Knollwood to experience a summer-camp atmosphere while expanding and reinforcing the English skills they had gained throughout the school year.

Abigail Pineda, a future Kaiser High School student, was one of 145 regional students who attended a week-long camp as part of the Inland Empire Future Leaders Program at Idyllwild Pines Camp. Although the program is currently available for every student in the region, Angelica Pineda, the mother of Abby, said many parents don't know about it, thus preventing their kids from taking part in a successful program. It was founded in 1985 to motivate Latino students to finish high school and attend college, said Dr. Tom Rivera, one of the founders.

For 11-year-old Zitlalik Avalos, summer break in Hamilton is about working to improve her English skills. She and dozens of other English Language Learner (ELL) students are attending Hamilton City Schools' first "Exploring Words Summer Camp" at two of the city schools in neighborhoods with large Hispanic and other foreign-born populations.

All summer, when his students in Northern Virginia are supposed to be enjoying time away from the classroom, Principal Clint Mitchell worries about whether the children who rely on free lunches during the school year are getting enough to eat. This week, the county school system launched an expanded effort to address that need through an old-fashioned method: community barbecues. All children, regardless of whether they are eligible for free meals during the school year, eat free, while adults pay $2. The lunches will be served every weekday until Aug. 26, except for Monday and the following day, the Fourth of July.

Young immigrants and refugees attending the Durham Public Schools' English as a Second Language Newcomer Academy sometimes struggle to find their words. But when they do, one would find it hard to believe that many of them have been in the country for less than a year and have spoken English for only a few months. “They have the most beautiful hearts and personalities and they’re so appreciative of the services that we have and the opportunity to learn,” said Charles Murrill, a sixth-grade math teacher as Githens Middle School who is working in the three-week program.